The dynasty of Vestris in the annals of ballet was founded by the engagement at the Paris Opéra in 1749 of Gaétan Vestris as principal male dancer in the serious, or noble, style (one of the three categories for principal dancers in use at the Opéra until 1830). He succeeded the celebrated Louis Dupré, who had long been acclaimed as the exemplar of the noble style that traced its origins to the court ballets of the previous century. Vestris, however, a Florentine by birth, brought to his performance a somewhat more flamboyant flavour, while respecting the traditional technique and manner of his predecessor. With his elegant figure and noble bearing, he made an immediate impression, and his brother’s exclamation that he was indeed “le dieu de la danse” (“the god of the dance”) gave him a sobriquet of which he was inordinately proud. At the time of his engagement, ballet was still a decorative feature of opera, and he appeared in many of the great opera-ballets of Jean-Philippe Rameau and André Campra. No dancer before him had received such acclaim, and the vanity this fostered in Vestris inspired many an anecdote; he was supposed to have said that there were only three great men in Europe: the king of Prussia, Voltaire, and himself.

Although he represented a historical tradition rooted in the court ballets of old, Vestris sensed the new direction that theatrical dancing was taking under the influence of the Enlightenment. The experience of participating in the ballets d’action being produced by Jean-Georges Noverre in Stuttgart, Germany, was a revelation. His portrayal of Jason in Noverre’s Médée et Jason (1763) revealed him as a natural and powerful mime, and he repeated his triumph by producing that ballet himself at the Paris Opéra, where he held the post of ballet master from 1770 to 1776.

In addition to gaining recognition for his talents as a dancer and a mime, Vestris became renowned as the most distinguished and sought-after teacher of his day; he perfected the two dancers who were to succeed him in the noble genre, Maximilien and Pierre Gardel. His most celebrated pupil, however, was his son by the dancer Marie Allard, Auguste; in developing Auguste’s virtuosity, he demonstrated himself to be a teacher with uncanny vision; instead of creating a dancer of the noble style in his own image, he produced one whose allure depended not on a proud and courtly presence but on a virtuosic technique, more attuned to the taste of later generations, that would lay the foundation for the domination of the French method of training in the century to come.

In 1792 Gaétan Vestris married the ballerina Anna Heinel. His sister Teresa (1726–1808) was principal dancer at the Opéra from 1751 to 1766, and his brother Angiolo (1730–1809) danced in Noverre’s company in Stuttgart.

Auguste Vestris

Gaétan Vestris’s son Auguste was equally illustrious. Trained solely and with the greatest care by his father, he made a single unofficial appearance at the Opéra (and was dubbed Vestr’Allard by a newspaper critic) in 1772, at age 12. Although he revealed extraordinary promise, his father withdrew him for further training before permitting his formal debut in 1776. Being admitted into the company, bearing the name Vestris alone, he rose rapidly to the forefront. As a dancer possessing unprecedented virtuosity, Auguste Vestris’s dazzlingly athletic style was very different from his father’s.

For many years he was the leading ballet star, and before the French Revolution he played leading roles in Noverre’s Les Petits Riens (1778) and Maximilien Gardel’s Mirza et Lindor (1779) and Le Premier Navigateur (1785). When social life in Paris recovered during the Consulate of Napoleon I, Vestris created the leading role in Pierre Gardel’s La Dansomanie (1800). In time younger dancers, notably Louis Duport, began to emulate and even build upon his technical prowess, but as if to compensate for the physical decline that came with the passing of years, Vestris began to reveal an increasing authority as a mime in characterizations such as Paul in Paul et Virginie (1806), Perseus in Persée et Andromède (1810), and Azael Azaël in L’Enfant prodigue (1812)—all ballets by Pierre Gardel. Auguste Vestris retired in 1816, and in his last years he became a greatly revered teacher, laying the foundation for a more virtuosic style that required added strength and stamina. His two most prominent pupils were Jules Perrot and the Danish dancer and choreographer August Bournonville, who was to perpetuate his teaching method in Copenhagen.

Auguste Vestris married twice, and his two sons, both of whom were born out of wedlock—Armand Vestris ( born (1786– (died 1825) ) and Bernardo Vestris (died (d. 1845) ) —attained some renown as choreographers.